the truth
by cheaterinpink
Summary: he knows she doesn't want to hear it. but he's tired of acting like a lovesick puppy, tired of hiding. goddammit, she's just like Katherine and that's why he wants her.


**The Truth**

**Summary:** He knows she doesn't want to hear it. But he's tired of acting like a lovesick puppy, tired of hiding. _Goddammit_, she's just like Katherine and that's why he wants her.

* * *

In truth, when he looks at her, he does see Katherine.

He supposes many would think he can't truly love her if he sees his former love in her. But, what _they_ can't see is that it's _because_ she's like Katherine that he'd take her over Katherine any day.

She isn't Katherine. But she's like her. And that's better.

Perhaps he should start from the beginning. He imagines it can be quite confusing if he doesn't go about it carefully.

* * *

_(He clear__s his throat.  
__**Headline of the page: **__similarities.  
__**Point in case:**__ Ice.)_

He could go into how Elena possesses the fire that Katherine has, but he'd rather talk about the ice.

Elena has that same mean bite Katherine had. Still has, actually. He remembers the way Katherine stringed him along, filling his head with the fondest ideas, surrounding him in a place full of light, light and nothing else. The moments he was with her were reprieves from the horrible world he lived in. It's now very laughable that he used to think, up to a few days ago, sadly, she was an angel.

_His_ angel, specifically.

When she left, discarding him like a rag doll she'd gotten tired of, he was suddenly plunged into pitch blackness, suffocating and clawing at the murky water's surface to find land too far away. He almost didn't make it.

Elena is different, but only by the littlest bit. She's stringing him along, though, of course, unintentionally. She doesn't _mean_ anything when she gently touches his arm or smiles at him. It's just a natural reflex, she might claim if he ever asked her, but he can read the light in her eyes like Stefan never could. She means something by it, much bigger than she'll ever admit to herself, that must never be said. So, the deception carries on and the apparent lack of guilt she feels for it chips at his heart a little every second.

They both feel no remorse for hurting him.

Katherine's illusion of innocence broke and shattered when she abandoned him. Elena's innocence holds on, even after she batters and tears him from the inside out. In more than one way, he feels that is even worse.

It makes her harder to hate (_but don't be disillusioned; he still manages to hate her_).

* * *

_(He sighs, eyelids half-mast._  
_**Point in case:** Rejection.)_

He knows she's pushing him away because she finds it so easy to forgive him. She's feeling all the things she shouldn't. She's angry at him and even more furious with herself.

She couldn't hold a grudge against him when she found out he'd been using Caroline as a toy slash snack (Caroline had been her friend since first grade and _'that means something'_ to her).

She started smiling at him again a mere few days after Vicky had died (which destroyed her brother, whom she would do anything to protect).

The latest rock he's thrown in their path lately was trying to kill Jeremy and even that vile act was for her. He knows she was – still _is_ – terribly conflicted; he can see it in her eyes every time she hugs Stefan and meets his eyes over Stefan's shoulder.

Stefan is her safety net, the one she knows will never let her fall, will never hurt her. The dark haired brother, on the other hand, is a trampoline (and here, he feels ridiculous for likening himself to a bouncy platform); she might fall off if she hits it at the wrong angle, but for the most part he'll keep on lifting her higher and higher. There's no limit.

He is reminded of her cowardly choice every day when she takes a small step towards him, falters and then steps back. He hopes that killing Jeremy helped her, made the hate she wants to feel come easily to her now, since it didn't help him.

You see, the same night he killed Jeremy, _she_ killed _him_.

"_I love Stefan; it's always going to be Stefan."_

It was a mirror image of Katherine's words.

Strangely, it hurt more to hear Elena say it despite the fact that he'd loved Katherine longer. Or perhaps he was in love with the idea of her – fast, daring, beautiful, dangerous Katherine. A great and terrible beauty. Katherine had never been kinder when she uttered, even somewhat apologetically, that she'd never loved him. It had set him free. It had lifted the burden of his feelings for her (accumulated, stored and ultimately destructive) off his chest. Even though he'd originally wanted her to pledge her undying love for him (ha, how he scoffs at the very idea now), he thinks he appreciates her twist on the fairytale a lot more.

He thinks, in fact, that he'd be disappointed if Katherine confessed true love for him.

But Elena – kind, gentle, protective Elena to everyone _but him_ – wasn't as kind when she rejected him. He'd rather have heard she didn't care about him at all. Because now he'll know that it's always the same. He'll try and do his damnedest best and still fail, always _nothing, absolutely nothing,_ in the light of his angelic _everything_ brother. He'll always make it halfway there and go no further, because his best is not enough. It never is. It wasn't with Father, or with Stefan, or with Katherine.

He wonders how he could have thought it'd be any different with Elena. Elena's deceptive kindness is even more dangerous than Katherine's blatant claws.

So, she didn't just kill him by not returning his imperfect love. She stabbed him with a sword and twisted it with the sole intention of seeing him crumble in pain by confirming what everyone thought about him. By agreeing with _them_.

It makes her harder to love (_but don't be disillusioned; he still manages to love her_).

* * *

He contemplates jumping up to her bedroom one last time to see her. He knows how peaceful she looks when she's asleep and doesn't think anyone's watching her. He's so _sorely, gut-wrenchingly tempted_ to just take a peek in (for closure, he claims eagerly) but he knows that as much as this desire overwhelms him, he can't. It wouldn't be right painting her in such pretty colours, bringing away a memory just as deceiving as she is in real life. He thinks it would be much better in the long run to remember her _the truthful way, the way she really is._

Maybe then, it'll be easier for the hate to override the love in his veins.

_(He's fooling himself; he'll still keep on loving her.)_

He stares longingly up at her window.

Isobel had said that the Salvatore brothers would be the death of her.

But he'd always thought that the Petrova doppelgangers could be the death of him.

That's why he's walking away before someone dies. Something Stefan never had the strength to. That makes him smile plaintively.

He strolls slowly down the footpath, hands in pockets, whistling partly in lament and partly in relief. He steps lightly in puddles of milk moonlight.

Letting her go is not as unburdening as letting Katherine go was. But he's happy she'll become a mere face in a far away memory after a few years, just a flimsy paper in the tornado of his mind.

If it doesn't come naturally, he'll stand in the shadows of every masquerade ball to come.

In her sleep, a single name graces her lips. It makes him hesitate for a split second, but then he's on his way, his face immovable stone. The night devours him whole and soon his whistling is a mere whisper of the cold, cold wind, a reminder that he's not there anymore.

No truth can be told without hurting someone.

- **fin**.


End file.
